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Age state political editor Annika Smethurst (Comment, 16/8) highlights the problem with rental e-scooters when she writes: “It offers a thrill, a smugness and a rare sense of fun.” This is exactly what a large number of scooters are being used for, however, I value my safety over someone else’s fun. We have trams all around the city, and if this 70-year old can easily get from one side of the CBD to the other, heavy art supplies in tow, I am sure those young men I see hooning (helmetless) along the footpaths should be able to manage. Liz Turner, Frankston South
The ban is the responsible thing to do
E-scooters in some ways are a great idea. They are quiet, fast, relatively cheap door-to-door transport. All good things. However, as we have seen in Melbourne and other countries, we cannot rely on users to use them safely.
Every day that I come into my office I see e-scooter users riding on the footpaths, riding the wrong way up one-way streets, or riding with two people on a scooter. The e-scooters have signs on them telling people they cannot ride on footpaths, one person to a scooter, and to obey road rules. The result, people don’t. Another result is people get injured. As a pedestrian, if you get injured by an e-scooter user, there is no insurance.
Realistically there is no way of effectively policing the use of e-scooters. At least a jay-walking pedestrian can be caught by police on foot. With e-scooters it would be almost impossible to stop a user who wanted to get away. Not to mention that police have more important things to do, and not enough resources as it is.
The only responsible thing the council can do is end the contracts and move on. If the council were to allow the contracts to continue, they would be complicit in the consequences that they know will occur.
Dr Simon Kinsella, Melbourne
The ‘shameful’ bit is the behaviour
In her enthusiasm for riding scooters, Annika Smethurst (16/8) quotes the lord mayor as saying micromobility technology is shameful. Actually, the ″shameful″ applies to many of their riders who ignore all the standards of responsible scootering. Reckless, helmetless, riding and dinking, causes havoc on the footpaths. Sure, riding scooters is fun, but not at the expense of the rest of the community. Well done, City of Melbourne.
Mike Reece, Doncaster
Good riddance to bad litter
I’m sure there are many like nurse Lucy Dahan (Comment, 14/8) who ride scooters responsibly and within the law but they are overwhelmingly outnumbered by illegal and dangerous users. E-scooters are not being banned, anyone is entitled to buy one and use it. The difference is we pedestrians won’t have to walk around those being dumped on footpaths.
David Parker, Geelong West
We CBD residents no longer feel safe
E-scooter users and operators have brought the Melbourne City Council decision on themselves. I started off as an avid e-scooter renter when they were introduced. They were particularly convenient when one had to zip across the city. I will miss their convenience, however, as a resident in the CBD, I do (with some reluctance) support the council ban on rental e-scooters.
Despite many police sting operations, as well as promises by the rental companies to introduce new technology to enforce existing laws better, residents in the CBD are confronted by unsafe and dangerous behaviour on a daily basis. The broader issue of course is the safety of the community as a whole. Especially those who live and work in the CBD. Apart from a clearly documented increase in emergency presentation, residents in the CBD no longer feel safe walking on our footpath.
Chia-Lung Tai, Melbourne
THE FORUM
Labor’s conscience?
I am angry, disappointed and in despair that the federal government is reconsidering the proposed total ban of gambling advertising on TV, despite the ban reportedly having bipartisan support.
I worked for nearly 10 years for the Salvation Army as a financial counsellor in the Gambler’s Help program and have seen firsthand the devastation caused to problem gamblers – family breakdowns, bankruptcy, repossession of family homes – and sometimes even suicide.
It is beyond belief that the ban proposed should now be watered down. The proposed ban looks like joining a long list of proposals to reduce gambling harm which have been watered down or simply forgotten.
This is a good opportunity for the government to demonstrate that it has a social conscience even when it comes at an apparent cost.
John Hartnett, Bentleigh East
A cowardly copout
There’s a ray of hope in the article “Labor MPs unite to make gambling ad ban stronger” (17/8). Nevertheless, I’m with respected social justice advocate Tim Costello who reveals that proponents of federal government’s call to cap gambling ads to two per hour admit it wasn’t evidenced-based but “a political decision”. A partial ban is a cowardly copout.
Kevin Burke, Sandringham
Restoring hope
Let’s hope the exciting and optimistic vision to restore the Yarra as depicted in NGV’s upcoming exhibition, Reimagining Birrarung, comes to be (“Going against the flow”, 17/8).
Most positively, the government’s Yarra Strategic Plan titled Burndap Birrarung burndap umarkoo, meaning what’s ″good for Yarra is good for all″, is a standout vision, deserving of all Melbourne’s sentient beings and beyond.
Ambition and hopefulness for a thriving river system offer an insurance policy against the devastation a heating planet will inflict upon us. A glorious natural Yarra parkland acting as the beating heart of Melbourne would certainly be a win for eco over ego.
Isabelle Henry, Ascot Vale
It’s about the medals
Columnist Peter FitzSimons has a strange idea of what the Olympics are all about (″45,000 signed an anti-Raygun petition!? What a bunch of haters you are″, 16/8). The Australian Sports Commission invested $398.3 million in high performance funding for Paris. The aim of that money, much of it from taxpayers, was to win as many medals as possible, not for athletes to have fun.
While Rachael Gunn should never be subject to personal hate, people are entitled to deride her voteless performance in a “sport” most of them think should never have been included in the world’s foremost sporting event in the first place.
Greg Hardy,
Upper Ferntree Gully
A lane for all
I agree with your correspondent (Letters, 15/8 ) that monster passenger vehicles pose considerable problems. Perhaps the time is coming for everyone to demand their own dedicated, appropriately sized lanes.
A lane for pedestrians (formally known as a path), a lane for bicycles, a lane for passenger cars, a lane for e-scooters and mobility scooters, a lane for taxis and buses, a lane for delivery trucks, a lane for large trucks, a lane for emergency vehicles e.g. police, ambulances and fire trucks, and of course a lane for SUVs and utes.
Pity about all the house demolitions that will have to occur, to say nothing about the removal of nature strips and trees.
Philip Bunn, Beechworth
ARIA’s bum note
Being a huge Australian music fan, I was gobsmacked to hear of the artists not in the ARIA Hall of Fame (“ARIA fails its Hall of Fame”, 17/8). I love Missy Higgins and have seen her perform live countless times, but to learn that female artists such as Vika and Linda, Deborah Conway, Christine Anu and perhaps most gobsmackingly Kate Ceberano have not been inducted floored me.
Trish O’Gorman, Carnegie
Helping teachers
Columnist Malcolm Knox (Comment, 16/8) is right about the crucial importance of literacy skills. It’s also worthwhile considering how challenging it is for teachers to provide individual literacy support. I am lucky enough to have a full-time assistant in my grade 4/5/6 class. But even with both of us, we are constantly stretched to meet the needs of 25 students, one-third of whom are diagnosed with dyslexia, dysgraphia, ADHD, ASD or a combination of these.
Without a doubt, the task that consumes the bulk of our time is assisting students with their writing work. It is an extremely time-consuming (although rewarding) task to help students with poor literacy skills or other additional learning needs to plan, write, edit, redraft and finish pieces of writing. How about post-graduate or undergraduate teaching students completing long-term, paid placements as assistants in classrooms? Or senior secondary students assisting as part of long-term work experience placements?
Let’s consider that no amount of ″explicit instruction″ (viewed by some experts as the current panacea for falling literacy and numeracy) can replace the value of sitting beside a student and guiding them to become better writers, readers and thinkers.
Katherine Beaton, Beechworth
Education’s gaps
As someone who has enjoyed an enriched life through the spoken and written word, I have never been able to grasp why we, as a society led by politicians, have accepted the outrageous inequality of our education system. Now, I do.
The reasons and consequences, so plainly stated in Malcolm Knox’s article, both terrify me and break my heart. Read it and weep.
Jane Ross, San Remo
The timidity of Labor
Your correspondent (Letters, 17/8) is absolutely right: after nine years of federal Coalition government we were ready for a bold, considered reformation of public policy and public life. Opportunities for reform were abundant, including setting up a strong anti-corruption commission, addressing growing social inequality, setting the country firmly on a road to reducing substantially our ever-growing carbon emissions, and more. But this government has been hesitant and unadventurous when approaching reforms, and has accompanied each forward step with a parallel backward one, such as making their anti-corruption commission invisible to the public gaze, modifying but retaining Stage 3 tax cuts, and building our renewable energy capacity while approving huge new oil and gas wells.
Instead of taking our country forwards with a clear vision of a better future, our government has remained in its shell, seeking to please everyone while offending no one. They are tinkering where they could have been transforming.
A wasted opportunity, and a tragedy for our country.
Chris Young, Surrey Hills
Boomers got lucky
Your correspondent (Letters, 16/8) argues that hard work is a common cause of Baby Boomers’ success. He is right. And Baby Boomers should not be criticised for spending, as he describes, ″money we earned″. What they did not acknowledge is that any success will always have its roots not just in hard work, but also opportunity and luck. Baby Boomers generally received a healthy dose of both.
Michael Radywonik, Moonee Ponds
Class plays a role
What the discussion about generational differences in wealth misses is the issue of class. There are Boomers who survive on a pension and who experience insecure housing. There are young people who, because of their family’s wealth, have enjoyed a good education, a good career and are able to enter the housing market. Why focus on age, why not consider instead the inequities of wealth distribution? The Boomer v others discussion simply hides the true reasons for disadvantage.
Marg D’Arcy, Rye
Not all cashed up
Not all Boomers are rolling in cash. I bought my first home at the age of 35, the interest rate was 17.5 per cent and the only place I could get a mortgage was with a building society in Western Australia.
Later I bought a house in rural Victoria and had to borrow 95 per cent of the purchase price and use a broker to get the deal. Recently I sold the property to move into a regional city after 23 years and the only reason I have money in the bank is because I bought a modest lower-priced house. My super fund has $7000 in it as I used most of it on a deposit on the current home.
As a woman working mainly for not-for-profit organisations my wages were not high and it was a struggle paying bills over the years.
I had to use a credit card at times to buy groceries during periods of unemployment and pay them off at inflated interest rates.
I retired at the age of 76 after 17 years with my last employer and started work at 18 so if I have some money in the bank I do not feel guilty.
I do feel for younger people and think that house prices are ludicrous and stamp duty an abomination used to prop up government coffers for absolutely no service.
Lynne Redman,
Sailors Gully
Not a way to treat a lady
Black Caviar deserved a proper retirement after her spectacular racing career.
Instead, she was almost constantly pregnant, pumping
out nine foals in just over 10 years. The thoroughbred racing industry has got a lot to answer for. How disappointing that her owners and carers did not properly rest this relatively young horse.
Now we are all grieving.
Lynda Graf,
Mt Eliza
AND ANOTHER THING
MSO
The MSO has missed the opportunity to be in the limelight for all the right reasons.
Meg McPherson, Brighton
Bravo, Bravo, Bravo. Let’s stand to loudly applaud the MSO musicians (″MSO musicians pass a vote of no confidence in management″, 17/8)
Catherine Bearsley, Mt Waverley
The keys on a piano, Jayson Gillham, are black and white, but not in politics. There are many grey areas. Maybe Gillham should stick to his music and let his fingers do the talking.
Myra Fisher, Brighton East
People claim they are silenced if they can’t protest at a performance they are involved in. If you allow one protest you have to allow the ones you don’t agree with. This is the bit they don’t get. Murray Horne, Cressy
Furthermore
Politicians, want to kill the ads without being brave? Just specify that the anti-betting message at the end is as long as the ad, and as expensive.
Mick Webster, Chiltern
The Altannah family (16/8) should have been granted three-year refugee visas instead of living with the frightening possibility of returning to Gaza next March. Haven’t they been through enough trauma?
Ian Cameron, Chelsea
When politicians use the term ″our country″ do they suggest that they speak for all of us? Peter Dutton does not speak for me.
Stephen Baldwin, Frankston
Will Peter Dutton’s next claim be the housing crisis is caused by Gaza refugees?
Thos Puckett, Ashgrove
Is it equine abuse to have a supposedly retired champion racehorse pregnant nine times from 2014 then euthanising her just after the last birth due to laminitis (a painful condition affecting the hooves and usually attributed to over eating)?
Noelene Chapman, Frankston
So how is Vladimir Putin’s special military operation going? Does it look any more like a war yet?
John Walsh, Watsonia
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